Elton

This is difficult to state but Elmo is often better than Fred. I don’t think Fred plays next week. Position will need strengthening if we stay up.

That was so poor suddenly Drinkwater seems like a big miss..

I think we just need another manager to manage us away from home..

There is reason to be optimistic. Our away form has actually been good since the change of formation. Burnley W Leicester D Brighton D The only disappointment was Bournemouth, which was a bit ‘after the lord mayor’s show’, a few days after pitch invasion celebrations. There is always an inevitable psychological down after such a high even if the later game was potentially more important.

Absolutely. We need to hope Man U reach the FA Cup semis as then that will be another night game too. Actually forget that, it’s Man U, so 3 points whenever. Also Sheffield United will be a night game as well, so those 3 games will help keep us up no problem. Sky have done their best to keep us up, quite a few night games at VP this season where/when we are basically unbeatable.

Of course, the truth hurts sometimes but I don’t think there is a downside for Villa. If anything the message might get through to those a little younger of what is required to make it.

I don’t have the slightest problem with what Purslow has said about 21/23 year olds still playing for the U23’s. Purslow knows it, the players themselves know it and most of the fans know it too. If those players lose motivation by being told the truth then they aren’t the right character to prove anyone wrong, as well as already being behind the required performance curve. Our academy aren’t shy to tell young players the truth about their prospects (or lack of) and plenty of once highly rated junior pros are released unceremoniously. It’s quite cut-throat and they all know what’s coming.

Man City preparing for League 2 already tonight by playing in front of a half empty stadium to get used to it.

Expected back for Chelsea on 14 March according to Purslow at the fan meeting.

I remain firmly in the sell over our dead body camp if we stay in PL. The days of lower PL clubs being bullied by other PL clubs have been over for a while. If anything the lower PL clubs are pulling the pants down of the buying clubs when they do sell and we don’t need the cash unless relegated. In some football cultures there would be huge pressure applied from the fan base on a player not to leave. Turkish football springs to mind a little. I don’t want us to be like that but it’s odd to me that our social media fan base seems to be very passive/submissive about the prospects of losing possibly someone who could go onto be our greatest player ever.

Connor has proven to often be a passenger at PL level when we don’t dominate, i.e most games. Drinkwater clearly hasn’t shown a lot yet and I don’t have high hopes. However, Smith isn’t an idiot, he will see qualities in Drinkwater that he thinks will improve the team over the likes of Connor. Drinkwater is getting a little better every match and I guess Smith thinks the benefit of getting Drinkwater match sharp is worth persevering with his current level of performance. Let’s hope the improvement curve gets a lot sharper soon or McGinn returns because Hourihane isn’t the solution to our midfield issues.

I don’t think Drinkwater should be in our first team with his current sharpness/fitness. Although apparently his passing completion was the highest of either side at 86% and had 4th (I think) most passes of either side despite playing only 60 minutes. He was better on Sunday although still a bit Socceraid.

Of course it’s different but still an example of a truly great player playing for his boyhood club and staying there for 10 years when he could have had guaranteed titles at Man U. He won nothing at Newcastle. Grealish is about to play in his 2nd major cup final for his boyhood club. Our owners seem to be serious players. Stay up and push on was the plan and I’m sure if we do that’ll be with Jack.

Alan Shearer is another. Gazza maybe and I’m sure there are others. 80 million plus doesn’t get you guaranteed quality that you are losing. Look at the 30/40m signings that the likes of Everton and West Ham have made.

Maybe I misunderstood the intention of your post as I agree with the above. I just don’t like the defeatist attitude a lot of our fans have to losing someone who could go onto be our best player of all time. I disagree though that it is inevitable to lose players that don’t want to be at a club. That was the case in the Yorke era and much more recently but there has been a sea change in the last couple of seasons. PL clubs know that the fee that they get will be mostly swallowed up by the replacement costs and the risk of relegation/not qualifying for Europe or whatever the selling peril is, is not worth it. Jack is not going on strike at his boyhood club. If players don’t want to see out contracts they shouldn’t sign them. We can hold onto him if we want to. Only way he can force a move is relegation as FFP/P&S will force us to and hopefully there isn’t a cut price relegation clause.

Exactly. Also he’s 24? Given his style of play I fully expect him to be playing at the top level well in to his mid 30’s if he wants to. He has a minimum 10 years of a top level career and is about to play in his 4th Wembley final (including 2 major comps) at the club he supports. He’s hardly being kept hostage.

So what? Zaha is too good for Palace. Anderson is too good for West Ham etc etc. Should every player at the club be on exactly the same level? The fact that so many fans share your view is madness and probably permeates to the player by social media. He is under contract and stays unless we choose to accept an offer. It’s that simple. Football has moved on, which is why clubs can’t even get Lewis Dunk out of Brighton or Zaha out of Palace. We need to have a bit more of the John Gregory attitude to players wanting to move on than waving them off like it’s inevitable. We should be fighting tooth and nail to keep our best players and I’m sure we will.

He does a lot more than win headers (which is incredibly important for a CB in a struggling team). He’s a real unit and difficult to beat on the floor or in the air. I fully accept he needs to tidy up his game in possession. I think a lot of that is down to maybe instruction and over confidence at times. He also doesn’t always have an easy out ball as our left side is often congested as the opposition look to block the supply to Jack. He can quite easily get his passing stats up by passing sideways and backwards if that’s what Smith wants from him and he is young and will learn. I like him and think he has a high ceiling because he is physically very well suited to the PL.

Jim, smoking is bad for your health and so is negativity. I bet you even think Man City are going to beat us in the final when we all know we’re coming home with the trophy.

As much as this was a kick in the nuts today I still think we are an improved team from December and I am confident we will stay up baring more injuries to key players. Although Spurs haven’t been great away, this was one of our toughest home games left and we should have come away with a point. There is no reason we can’t be optimistic of points in our remaining home games and I think we can get enough at home and maybe one or 2 wins away against the likes of Southampton, Newcastle, will see us safe. I think the return of McGinn in maybe 2 league games will see the end of Drinkwater and we’ll have the personnel to control the midfield a lot better. Wins in easiest order: Man U Home (Obviously so just add 3 points now). Newcastle Away (worst team we’ve played at VP this season and their defensive set up will suit us again). Crystal Palace Home Sheffield United Home (night game so guaranteed win). Southampton Away (worst home record in PL). Wolves Home (normally beat these at home). So that’s 43 points minimum before we play Everton and West Ham and we’ll beat either Chelsea or Arsenal too..

To blame Terry is nonsense. Smith’s philosophy is going ‘toe to toe’ with opponents, so the defence will be exposed more than a team with 11 men behind the ball and very few of us want to see that. We are mostly too easy to get at but this is as much to do with the team set up and midfield as the defence. Even our ability to get the ball to stick up front clearly won’t help. We have a very young and inexperienced defence and team generally. I still expect us to improve over the last 2/3 months.

Yep, me too. But it seems winning every header and most tackles isn’t a significant attribute for a Centre Back for a lot of our fans on this forum. Although he was well received in the ground today as he did a lot of good defensive work. He’ll get better on the ball too. Still very young and inexperienced for a CB.

It was a penalty all day. Total gift. Surprised referee didn’t give it. Hause is so much better than Engels. I really don’t understand why so many fans don’t rate being able to win headers, speed, strength as absolute key attributes of a defender over the odd lapse pass. Luckily Smith and Terry know what is needed to be a centre half, which is why Engels is 4th choice right now.

He gifted them 2 goals, that’s a shocking performance in anyone’s books surely?

Tough one to take but our charitable defending costs us again. Engels is too slow and so is Drinkwater in front of him. Mings and Nakamba would have made a huge difference to the amount of times Spurs were running through onto Reina. Still there were positives. We rode our luck a little last but should have gone 2 up in a very positive 1st half performance. Samatta looks encouraging and will hopefully only get better. Defence needs more protection by us keeping the ball better. Hopefully McGinn won’t miss too many more games.